How to become a dermatologist in UK

Becoming a dermatologist is not an easy or a quick option, but if you have the patience and the skills to have what it takes, then you could open up a varied, well paid and rewarding career. So, how do you you go about becoming a dermatologist in UK, how long will it take and what are your career prospects?

The job description

What is the the job description of a dermatologist? Becoming any doctor means that you have to prepare to study and work for a long time before you reach your goal. It takes at least 12 years to become a consultant dermatologist. Once you are there, you will be responsible for any thing to do with the skin, hair and nails. This could be from eczhema to psoriasis to skin cancer or third degree burns. You need to be caring, determined, hardworking and have excellent communication skills.

Getting there

How to become a dermatologist: School and university To start with, you have to go through medical school for five years. To get the grades to enter medical school, you need at least 3 A-levels (or highers), one of which must be chemistry and the others, preferably biology, physics or mathematics. You must be good at English and basically, have an all around excellent report card. Upon completition of university Once you have finished your gruelling final exams, you must prepare to do a year of your foundation year at a designated hospital. In this year, you will be known as an FY1 and will rotate between specialities to gain experience. Once you have finished this year, you can be registered with the general medical council and thus, enter the profession of a doctor.

Once you are a doctor

Starting your dermatology career You will need to work for two further years (FY2 and FY3) in the area of general medicine to continue to get a higher level of education and to gain entrance to the Royal college of physicians. Once you have completed this, you need to start looking around in the highly competitive world of dermatology for a specialist registrar posting (SpR). Becoming a consultant You will need to train in your specialism for four years before you can start looking around for consultant dermatologist positions. Once you have this position, you will be gaining experience and knowledge all the time, thus becoming a better dermatologist as time goes by. What is a dermatologist salary The amount you get paid depends entirely where you are in your career development. An experienced consultant can expect to earn over £125,000. When you first begin as a level one foundation doctor, you will earn around £20,000.